


Intruding on my Feelings

by natika



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: (not a head injury), Anxiety, Detroit, Episode 4, Flashbacks, Friends to Best Friends, Gen, Pre-Canon, Roommates, Yuuri is an unreliable narrator, hospital waiting room, minor injury, several posters of Viktor Nikiforov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-08
Updated: 2017-01-08
Packaged: 2018-09-15 15:42:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9242444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/natika/pseuds/natika
Summary: A rinkmate got into an accident, and Yuuri was torn up with worry.It must have been Phichit.--They had been introduced formally. Yuuri had bowed, Phichit had made a wai; Yuuri had chanced a shy smile and Phichit had grinned widely, and Celestino had left them to it.Phichit's first words to him were, "Can I have your number?"





	

Yuuri hunches up in the car, fumbling with his laces. Halfway to the hospital and he still hasn't managed to get them tied.

In the driver's seat, Laura has finally fallen silent, although he can feel the concern radiating off her. It makes his skin prickle all over to think of that energy so misplaced.

He knows better than to close his eyes, his brain too busy trying to piece together the events on the practice rink that already seem a lifetime away. The clock on the dashboard says otherwise; not even forty minutes.

"You want me to drop you off before I park up?" Laura asks gently. She always uses that tone of voice around Yuuri. It makes him feel like a skittish animal.

"You don't have to stay," he mutters.

"He's my rinkmate too," she says, and the forced patience in her voice makes him wish the ground would open up and swallow him whole.

"Sorry." He drops his head down further, feeling the ache in his spine. "I'll - I'll wait for you."

It had happened right at the end of the group training session: spirits were high, concentration low. Yuuri had been dawdling, loath to leave the ice as usual, whilst the others expressed that same feeling by chasing around, Phichit with his phone out in his daily quest for the perfect selfie. Everyone converging upon the same point.

All Yuuri remembers clearly after that is Phichit's phone spinning away across the ice.

*

They had been introduced formally. Yuuri had bowed, Phichit had made a _wai_ ; Yuuri had chanced a shy smile and Phichit had grinned widely, and Celestino had left them to it.

Phichit's first words to him were, "Can I have your number?" with his phone appearing in his hand just like that. Yuuri blinked at him, and then dug into his bag.

"Is that your dog?" was the second question, Phichit apparently having no regard for personal space nor lock screen privacy.

"Er," said Yuuri, flustered and feeling a familiar pang of homesickness, "Yes?"

"He's so cute!" Phichit glanced up at Yuuri's face, back down to his phone, and then actually batted his eyelashes. "Would you show me some more? Please?"

And somehow Yuuri found himself talking about his dog for the next half an hour while Phichit sat next to him, eyes sparkling and prompting him diffidently for more. The conversation kept flowing, into skating, onto the ice, all through practice and off again, over to dinner, back to Phichit's room and on and on until well after midnight.

After almost a week of more or less the same - plus numerous tutorials on posting to instagram - Phichit took a deep breath and said, "Yuuri, wouldn't you rather be roommates with me?"

"Yes!" Yuuri blurted out, and then froze, looking shocked at how sudden, how certain he'd sounded.

"Whoa!" said Phichit, "I'm pretty sure that was the right answer!"

*

Laura finds him tucked away in a corner of the waiting room. 

"Are you sure you don't need anyone to look at you too?" she asks. "You did - kinda - it was all a bit of a pile-up, you know? And then you -"

Yuuri works very hard on not choking. "I'm fine." He wondered if he stays staring at the floor long enough she will go away.

"I'm sure they're just running tests, you know, precautions." She doesn't sound sure. Merely looking down no longer seems adequate. He wants to crawl under the chair and hide. Or possibly pass out. "I'll - go and see what I can find out."

He mumbles, "Thank you," and listens to the sound of her shoes squeaking on the tiled floor, counts to ten before he lets his breathing give himself away.

*

Phichit said, happily, "I'll tell my father you're teaching me more Japanese, he's always said I should learn properly."

" _Douyatte Nihongo wo benkyou shimashita ka_?" said Yuuri, feeling more than a little like he was being steamrollered and trying to work out why he didn't mind it in the slightest.

" _Arai na kap_?" Phichit beamed angelically, then reverted to English. "I haven't; there were just plenty of Japanese students at my school, so - left corner down a bit, it's not straight - now it's good."

Yuuri pushed the tack carefully through the existing hole in the poster and on into the wall and thought, he talks so much I can't help but learn some more English from him. And then he instantly felt ashamed of thinking that. "Teach me some words in Thai, too," seemed the only fair compromise.

Phichit dissolved into laughter and waved his hand down, " _Phaw laew - mai pen rai_ \- ooh, that's a good one; you should know that. _Mai pen rai_."

" _Mai ben rai_ ," Yuuri imitated dutifully, finishing that poster. "Means?"

"Lots of things," said Phichit, "when you translate it, but right now it means 'no problem'." And he winked, and passed up the next picture in the pile. 

*

And breathe, and -

*

"I really-really-really -" Phichit manages to pronounce three repeated words as one "- would have asked you first, just I ran into this girl and she had them right there and I know you're not so hot on answering your phone and I had to rescue them, she was going to abandon them and I looked at them and look! Look at their colours! And I thought it had to be a sign and please tell me you don't have any allergies but if you do I absolutely will find another home for them and you won't even notice they're there, not unless you want to of course and is that okay and hello."

Yuuri blinked; it was all taking a while to parse. He concentrated on the salient point, being the cage containing hamsters sitting on Phichit's desk.

"What are their names?" seemed a reasonable thing to ask.

Phichit let out an honest-to-god squeal. "I knew you'd be the best roommate ever!"

*

\- exhale, and -

*

Yuuri woke up the day before he was due to leave for Skate Canada with a familiar stone sitting in his stomach. He checked his phone, 4:02am, suppressed a sigh, and crept out to the bathroom to meditate on nausea.

Phichit poked his head around the door at 6:05, said, "Good morning! Made you some tea!" and was gone again before Yuuri had a chance to respond.

At 6:24 Phichit came back and set the mug down beside him.

At 7:03 Phichit came back again, said, "I think I might be doing this wrong," and physically dragged Yuuri back to his bed, threw the covers over him, smoothed them down and then said very fast, "Goingtotakeashowernow."

*

"I got you some water." He'd missed Laura coming back, and it's too late but he fights to get his outward semblance under control. He raises his gaze just enough to level at the cup being held out towards him. "No one will tell me anything and coach's phone is going straight to voicemail, so we'll just have to wait."

"Thank you." There's a heavy pause, in which he can almost feel her thoughts shift back and forth like sand. Then she sits down next to him. He grits his teeth.

*

_cant wait u get back hamsters miss u_  
_they sobbing in their cage_  
_and pooing on ur pillow_  
_555555555555555555_  
_also your PCS was criminal_  
_what were the juges looking at smh_  
_bring back yr protocols we can set them ON FIRE_  
_seriously wat u do to the ramen it tastes 500% better when u make it_  
_all the chilli oil in the world is not helpin_  
_check ig_

*

and relax, relax, relax-relaxrelax...

*

"My father took me ice-skating first," said Phichit. Their heads were touching just above the temples, bodies at a ninety degree angle, and they were both staring at the ceiling. Yuuri was clinging onto the sheets like grim death. "I think he lied about my age, he was desperate to take me, he loved it so much he couldn't wait."

Yuuri waited while Phichit waited, comfortable and companionable, just there.

"And of course it was the best thing ever, and then I saw the King and the Skater and I just thought magical ice was - that's to say I think I thought it was real and that's when I decided I was going to be a skater." Small Phichit had apparently invested a lot of time and energy into attempting to create a magical ice rink on the roof garden. "That and a lot of elaborate jumping off the sofa."

Yuuri felt his lips twitch, a recognised shared memory.

"Your turn, _Khun_ Yuuri-kun."

Without ever spelling it out, they'd begun to develop a language of their own in a few near-innocuous phrases, that instead said things like: I will leave with you now if you want me to; ignore that jerk; please drag me out of bed; hide your phone; a reply is not necessary; _mai pen rai_.

Yuuri sometimes wished that Phichit were a few years older. The first years in Detroit had set too much of a precedent: too much time trying to deal with things alone; too many walls.

"My ballet teacher suggested I take up - take skating up," he said. His voice sounded steady, for all that it barely sounded at all. "I always - I thought - maybe I spent too much time in her studio, or maybe she had an arrangement with the coach at the rink, giving business to each other."

Phichit laughed, tapping his ear against Yuuri's. Phichit, who walks through walls because he refuses to see them. "It wouldn't be unusual."

"I - The first time I didn't like it."

He had to give those words space. They didn't seem right, somehow. Phichit treated them with the contemplation they deserved. Or perhaps he was just waiting for Yuuri to finish. Returning the favour.

"I mean, not exactly that, but wasn't love at first skate for me. I wasn't in control of my body. I didn't know what to do and the ice was so, um, big. I felt lost."

He'd never told this to anybody. 

It was several moments later when Phichit said, on a sharp intake of breath, "Sounds like moving to fucking Detroit."

Yuuri rolled over onto his stomach; it cushioned the punch. "Let's go to the rink."

Phichit grabbed his hand and they levered themselves up together.

*

"It wasn't anybody's fault," says Laura firmly, "these things happen all the time." 

At least it sounds like the sort of thing she would probably be saying, if Yuuri could tune in properly.

*

Phichit stepped into their room, shoes in hand, glanced at Yuuri and barely hesitated before launching his bag toward an unsuspecting chair, "Have you eaten yet?" And then, because the answer was as obvious as it was unforthcoming, he said, "Pop quiz: What is Viktor's shoe size; when did Viktor first land a quad sal in competition; why are you trying to communicate with Viktor telepathically through a poster? Viktor, Viktor Viiiiiiiktor!"

"Huh?" Yuuri attempted to surface through a wave of messy thoughts. "Oh, hi Phichit. How was training?"

"Quite good," said Phichit cheerfully, bouncing onto his bed and curling up there. "Pity a three-and-half toe is not a recognised jump, 'cause I nailed that, and now my knees are killing me and I want a burger. Tell me I can have a burger?"

"You can have a burger?" Yuuri parroted back, and Phichit sat up, alarmed. 

"Nonono, we practised this! 'Phichit, it is not a MOS burger and you will regret it.'"

"You'd regret a MOS burger too," Yuuri pointed out vaguely.

"Not as much." Phichit sighed melodramatically. "Well, I would if I was there but I'm here and ugh, American food. Let's kidnap Ciao Ciao and move to Japan. I'm sure he likes the two of us best anyhow. Where shall we live?"

"Oh," thought Yuuri, two hours later, once he and Phichit had hatched a plan for a chain of skating rink-burger bars with a cute hamster mascot that would take the world by storm, " _Oh._ "

He tried to say thank you, but Phichit just stared at him, eyes wide and guileless. "We were just chatting, Yuuri! Better that than a burger!"

*

"Are you - again?" This time, he didn't need to hear the words, he'd heard the same sigh so many times. "Oh, Yuuri, everything's going to be okay."

*

Phichit was normally so unselfconsciously sunny and fine it always took Yuuri by surprise on the rare occasions that he wasn't. But when he thought about it, Phichit had never made any secret of being homesick: he talked about it enough times, but politely, with a smile on his face, as if the feelings were a minor inconvenience to be shaken off any time. Phichit had no shortage of words to describe how he was feeling and he seemed to use them all with ease. Yuuri didn't have the words even stuck inside his head.

He watched Phichit on the ice earnestly chatting with Celestino, both of them waving their arms around descriptively.

He thought, If I weren't here, Phichit could easily persuade Celestino to let him train in Bangkok.

That thought never really went away, stuck at the back of his mind like an itch he couldn't scratch, there to bother him on long flights, practice warm-downs, and sleepless nights.

*

His own sigh never had any chance of vocalising.

*

_YAY CONGRATS_  
_congrats on sinning Nationals_  
_wINNING_  
_sin later 55555_  
_just make sure u tell me all about it_  
_sin at worlds OMG ur going to worlds I'll do ur makeup_  
_Nat champ again finally congrats_  
_Japan better be nice to u_  
_but not so nice u not come back_  
_I ordered a rice cooker on Amazon I am weak without u_  
_SO HAPPY NEW YEAR_  
_gonna hit 4CC with epic 4T-3T an come 2 worlds with u_  
_#friendshipgoals_  
_also only way not to starve to death_  
_Laura + Aimee say congrats too_  
_And Mike and Ping_  
_and everyone_  
_check ig_

_I only won because all the other skaters had falls._  
_But thanks._  
_Talk later? I will meet my sister with Vicchan now._

*

Laura pulls him into a hug, and Yuuri doesn't flinch, doesn't hunch, doesn't relax.

He suffocates.

His hands come up and shove.

*

They cut classes when it's time for Europeans: they both had miserable colds and Phichit had given up trying to insist he wasn't feverish. Yuuri dragged his blanket over to Phichit's bed - always that way around, never the other - and they huddled round Phichit's laptop to watch every single program, quiet at first, then wincing in tandem with every fall. By the halfway point they were good-naturedly barracking the scores.

Yuuri, restless, went to make ramen while the ice was being resurfaced before the final group, and Phichit tried and failed a few more times to find a stream with commentary in English. Then he artfully arranged his bowl of noodles with the laptop and a box of Kleenex and uploaded the resulting photograph to Instagram. 

"No selfie?" Yuuris asked round a mouthful when he showed it to him.

"Looking like this?" Phichit ducked his head under the comforter and blew his nose again. "Are you crazy? I have standards!"

"Come out, they're warming - up." 

The drop in tone was something Phichit had become extremely tuned into. He suspected Yuuri still had no idea he was even doing it. "Is it safe?"

"Viktor's changed his costume," Yuuri said dreamily, and Phichit whipped the covers off his head to stare, then whistle.

"He must be freezing!" was about the only neutral thing that Phichit could think of to say, although it was a topic constantly at the forefront of his mind in winter. He glanced over when Yuuri didn't reply. 

His first instinct was to take a picture. He gave in to it.

(Phichit's instagram was littered with pictures of Yuuri. Yuuri at the rink; Yuuri at the dance studio; Yuuri cooking for them in the kitchen; a lump under the blankets that has never been confirmed not to be Yuuri; shots of the two of them here, there and everywhere. Occasionally he logged into Yuuri's account and posted them there instead.)

He was aware of the line across which he should not post; just never too sure where exactly that line may be drawn on any given day. So he turned the screen round and held it out. 

He needed to keep two phones on him really. Yuuri's reactions to photos of himself were often priceless.

"Just think," said Phichit, oh-so-innocently, "you're going to see that costume in person at Worlds!"

Viktor broke his world record again, and also, Phichit suspected, Yuuri's brain.

*

Did she feel him shaking? Can she see him shaking? 

Yuuri stammers out an apology but even as the words leave his mouth he knows he doesn't mean them. 

They come out in Japanese, so maybe she can't tell.

*

Phichit knew Yuuri had other friends - mostly from the Dance Studio although one or two Japanese people have also crept in from various courses - and of course Phichit had other friends too (not to mention a lot of followers on sns) - but he realised early on that Yuuri never invited anyone back to their dorm room. 

He thought at first that it may have more to do with the shrine to Viktor Nikiforov on the walls of the room than it did with him, but after a while he decided that it was mostly about Yuuri.

Then he decided it was his room too.

So he didn't invite anyone else back either.

*

"Yuuri!" The laugh is air-shattering, a beacon shining through fog, an invitation that's impossible to miss. "Laura!"

Laura says something muddy and disappointed and weird-sounding.

Phichit replies, while Yuuri tries to surface, "Please, it's not even a bad sprain! The point is, I just had to sit in the hospital for over two hours without a phone. I'm not sure I made it." He thrusts out a hand towards Yuuri, wrist bent back. "Better check my pulse!"

Yuuri looks at Phichit's hand, at the nicks on his fingers, at the sliver of the vein running up his palm, a place to focus.

He puts his phone into it.

" _Ichi tasu ichi wa_!" Phichit pronounces, winks, and takes a selfie before Yuuri can do more than splutter.

"Oh my God," says Laura, "Yuuri, you didn't think...?"

"I'm alive!" cheers Phichit, pivots on his crutches, slides neatly into the space between the two seats, brandishes the phone aloft and tilts his head sideways til the side of his head brushes Yuuri's ear. "Get in!"

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies for mangled Thai (and probably mangled Japanese too) - I hope context suffices for the most part. Corrections welcomed!
> 
> I had to cut out a lot about the hamsters because they were taking over the fic.


End file.
